State Senator - District 10
James Sanders Jr.
Has represented Senate District 10 in southeast Queens since 2013 and chairs the Senate Banks Committee and the Senate Select Majority Task Force on Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises.
Issues James is raising
Banking, credit and minority-owned businesses
Sponsored laws barring the use of consumer credit history in hiring, employment and licensing decisions and requiring food stores and retailers to accept cash, and a 2024 law raising state agencies' discretionary buying threshold to $750,000 for certain goods and services from minority-, women- and service-disabled-veteran-owned businesses.
Housing, rents and homeowners
Voted for the 2025 law on landlords' use of algorithmic pricing to set residential rents and sponsors a 2025 bill on reducing taxes under shelter rent that is in the Senate Housing Committee; his Senate biography says he sponsored the 2022 Foreclosure Abuse Prevention Act.
Civil rights and racial equity
Sponsored the 2026 law requiring restrictive covenants that discriminate against a protected class, in violation of state or federal law, to be modified before real property is sold, and co-sponsored the 2023 law creating the New York State Community Commission on Reparations Remedies.
Health care
Sponsored 2023 laws on collaborative models for addressing health care disparities and on insurance coverage and notice for colorectal cancer screenings, voted for the Medical Aid in Dying Act, which passed the Senate 35-27, and voted for the 2024-25 health and mental hygiene budget bill.
State budget and taxes
Voted for the 2026-27 state fiscal plan bill and the 2024-25 education, labor, housing and family assistance budget bill, and was one of 12 senators voting no on a retroactive property tax exemption for Yeshivas Nachlas Sofrim, which passed 47-12 and became law.
Background
A Marine Corps veteran raised in the Hammel Houses in the Rockaways, he served 12 years on the New York City Council for District 31.
- Chair of the New York State Senate Committee on Banks
- Chair of the Senate Select Majority Task Force on Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises
- Vice president of the National Black Caucus of State Legislators
- State senator for District 10 since 2013; won the seat in 2012 after defeating incumbent Shirley Huntley in the Democratic primary
- Re-elected on Nov. 8, 2022 with 98.5% of the vote and on Nov. 5, 2024 with 71.0% (68,074 votes) against Michael O'Reilly
- New York City Council member for District 31, elected in 2001 and serving 12 years; unanimously voted chair of the Council's Economic Development Committee, the first African American to hold the post
- Served ten years on Queens School Board District 27, seven as its first African American president
- Worked for then-U.S. Rep. Floyd H. Flake
- Served three years in the U.S. Marine Corps
- Bachelor's degree in history, specializing in African-American studies, from Brooklyn College (1984); graduate of Far Rockaway High School
- Born in the Hammel Houses, a public housing development in the Rockaways
- His campaign website says he introduced a Fair Wage Act in his first Senate term to raise the statewide minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, indexed to inflation, and let municipalities set minimums up to $13.13; introduced a bill criminalizing pointing laser pointers at airplanes; and passed legislation criminalizing the sale of ammunition to minors
Support
New York Working Families Party
Also on your ballot on the Working Families Party line
Money
$99K
raised
Top donors: NYS Troopers PAC, 1199 SEIU-NYS Political Action Fund, Tim Mages